Withings WiFi body scale review: weight data and cool graphs

There's a certain subset of people who love to see data and graphs, especially …

Those who know me or follow my coverage know that I tend to take an interest in fitness-related gadgets and software. If it provides me data about myself and my activities, I'm on board. The BodyMedia FIT that I reviewed last year and RunKeeper on the iPhone are two of my favorites for this reason, but there's always more to be learned—if I can do that without having to do any of the dirty work, even better.

That's where the Withings body scale comes in. It's not a brand new gadget, but it recently came into my life as a result of a disturbing increase in chatter among my peers. You could say that the peer pressure got to me, and now I'm a Withings convert.

What's so special about a scale that comes equipped with WiFi? It's not just so you can tweet your body weight every day (though you could if you really wanted to). The scale allows you to track trends in your weight as well as body composition changes over time—graphs and all—and you don't even have to lift a finger to enter that data into WeightBot or PhysicsDiet to get them. Not only that, but the free service that comes with your physical scale integrates with a plethora of other services (including WeightBot, in fact) so that your data is everywhere you want it to be. And all you have to do to get it is step on the scale.

It's pretty and expensive

At $159, the Withings scale isn't exactly something you'll find in the bargain basement bin at Walmart. It's not a cheap scale, and if all you want is a device to spit a number back at you before your morning coffee, then there are thousands of other options that are more affordable. It's even a bit expensive if you compare it against some of the basic body-fat-analyzing scales out there (the old one that I retired after getting the Withings scale probably cost me about $90 back in 2004).

But for a WiFi-equipped gadget that comes with free support, a free Web service, and free mobile apps, the price of the Withings scale is not all that terrible. It gets a bonus, too, because it looks nice; the scale has a smooth glass surface and there are white and black options—very Apple-like.

The scale requires four AA batteries to operate, and it reports its own battery life back to you via the Web (which we'll get to in a second). Based on our own experience, a set of batteries will certainly last more than a month for two people weighing in every day, and sometimes twice a day (hey, we like data points, okay?). According to the battery indicator, it took four weeks for our scale to go down from 100 to 94 percent battery.

Others have reported anywhere from 3 weeks to several months when it comes to battery life, which is still shorter than what you'll get with a less feature-rich scale (I don't think I have ever changed the batteries in my old scale in seven years). But if you rotate out a set of rechargeable batteries, you'll at least be able to live with yourself a little better than if you're constantly tossing four AAs at a time.

Initial setup

In order to set up the scale, you must first connect it to a computer via USB and download an application from Withings' website.

Once downloaded, the program will connect to your scale and allow you to set up things like your WiFi network and input the users who will be weighing themselves, as well as an account that you'll use online to track your data. If there are any firmware updates available for your scale, the application will make sure your scale has the most recent version.

The reason you should input the users before starting is because the scale can automatically tell different people apart based on weight and body composition, but it needs something to go off of for the first weighing (plus you can give yourselves names so you know who's who when you weigh in). It's pretty good at detecting which user is which, even if the weight you enter yourself doesn't quite match up with what the scale sees for you—as long as you're different enough, it'll figure out that the male who weighs 210 pounds is a different person than the female who weighs... less than that.

Once you have the device set up, you can configure how you want it to work via the account preferences on the Withings website. This is where you'll be able to see your scale's battery life, serial number, and software version, and you'll be able to change things like the language, whether you want it to send anonymous debug data, and whether you want it to ask you to force zero at weigh-in.

You can change these things at any time without throwing off what's already been recorded for you, but the changes won't go into effect until your next weigh-in since the device is essentially sleeping between uses.

Jacqui Cheng
Jacqui is an Editor at Large at Ars Technica, where she has spent the last eight years writing about Apple culture, gadgets, social networking, privacy, and more. Emailjacqui@arstechnica.com//Twitter@eJacqui

I laughed at this a bit, but come on.... You *do* realize it's often a lot more complicated than that, right? For starters, it's about WHAT goes on that fork, just as much as it's about how often it's in someone's mouth. It's also about the amount of activity a given person does or doesn't do. And lastly, it's about whether or not someone is comfortable just living with their body's natural "set point", or if they're constantly battling to maintain a weight that's different than where their body chemistry and metabolism naturally want it to fall. (Oh, and sometimes? It's about a lack of realization of just how many calories can be found in what you DRINK.... You can cut way back on eating and still find you're not losing any weight at all, if you're drinking a lot of juices - which while "healthy", contain a lot of calories.)

ClownRazer wrote:

I still can't believe people find it so hard to not put the fork in their mouth too many times. The math here is easy.

Most of the time, manufacturers state alkalines only for low-drain kit because rechargeables (used to) self-discharge quite badly. Now that we have Eneloops (and various other manufacturers' equivalents), that's less of a big deal.

The main hiccup is that they won't have calibrated their battery meter for the (very) different discharge curve of a Nickel rechargeable, so it'll be pretty inaccurate.

Still, I wouldn't imagine it's that big a deal to just stick with alkalines. Their FAQ reckons 6 months to a year on a set of AAA's, so it would take quite a while to recoup the investment of a set of rechargeables there.

My biggest concern on uploading to their servers isn't so much a privacy thing (you can look at me and guess I'm over 200lbs) moreso for longevity. If they go tits up, it cripples the functionality of the whole thing.

I suppose you could do some packet sniffing, reverse-engineer the protocol it uses and then fake it out with a fake DNS entry on your own network, but that's the sort of hassle that something like this is supposed to avoid.

My biggest concern on uploading to their servers isn't so much a privacy thing (you can look at me and guess I'm over 200lbs) moreso for longevity. If they go tits up, it cripples the functionality of the whole thing.

I suppose you could do some packet sniffing, reverse-engineer the protocol it uses and then fake it out with a fake DNS entry on your own network, but that's the sort of hassle that something like this is supposed to avoid.

If you're just concerned about the longevity of your data, their website offers an option to export it in CSV format.

It's not so much the longevity of the data, but whether the service would go away altogether. If the company folds, you have a very fancy scale that has nobody left to talk to.

Don't get me wrong - I can see why they chose to do it this way. Set up over Wifi like this, they don't require you to run a computer all the time to collect and present the data. I'm somewhat tempted to try one out for myself.

However, the option to run locally (especially on a Linux device of some description - I have a plug at home) would be very much appreciated.

It's not so much the longevity of the data, but whether the service would go away altogether. If the company folds, you have a very fancy scale that has nobody left to talk to.

Don't get me wrong - I can see why they chose to do it this way. Set up over Wifi like this, they don't require you to run a computer all the time to collect and present the data. I'm somewhat tempted to try one out for myself.

However, the option to run locally (especially on a Linux device of some description - I have a plug at home) would be very much appreciated.

I've seen that, and have considered borrowing one to see if I couldn't get something fairly user-friendly set up.

With some additional instrumentation, it could be quite promising. It would definitely need some sort of indication that it had completed measuring your weight so you could step off, which might be challenging in the case where the software was running on a headless system. Otherwise, the wife acceptance factor would be zero.

Bluetooth's range is also a bit of a limiting factor, especially through walls.

Forget all this fancy stuff; does anyone know of an reasonably priced scale that provides decent accuracy? The last two we purchased seemed to have a resolution of 1 kg, which is pretty crappy. The cheap spring based analog scales we had as kids were better than that (or at least had better repeatability if not better accuracy).

I bought this one for my mom: http://www.amazon.com/EatSmart-Precisio ... 261&sr=8-1after reading the reviews. I used that scale myself a few times when over at mom's place, I have no complaints. The scale's pretty accurate and nice-looking too. Don't know if it fits your definition of reasonably-priced, but my reasonably-priced $20 Taylor scale is a POS that finally kicked the bucket.

ClownRazer wrote:

I still can't believe people find it so hard to not put the fork in their mouth too many times. The math here is easy.

It has to do with the fact that people buy expensive gadgets, get gym memberships, and hire personal trainers, and generally, it's not helping. Anecdotally, I'm sure this scale has changed someone's life. But until people can stop over-feeding themselves, nothing will help.

The weight loss industry continues to fleece. Oh, and our insurance rates are going up. Really, it actually makes me angry. I'd hope it'd make people angry enough to change their habits (for their sake, their family's sake, and for the sake of our society), but it doesn't seem to.[/quote]

It has to do with the fact that people buy expensive gadgets, get gym memberships, and hire personal trainers, and generally, it's not helping. Anecdotally, I'm sure this scale has changed someone's life. But until people can stop over-feeding themselves, nothing will help.

The weight loss industry continues to fleece. Oh, and our insurance rates are going up. Really, it actually makes me angry. I'd hope it'd make people angry enough to change their habits (for their sake, their family's sake, and for the sake of our society), but it doesn't seem to.

[/quote]

I understand your point, and it is valid... but I still don't know where you're trying to go with it, at least in this thread.

I've recently dropped ~25 pounds and am back to my "normal" weight of around 165-170, and did it all with simply exercising and eating smarter (not necessarily less), and certainly did it without any fancy gadgets, equipment, or even an awesome scale that records your biometrics and puts them all in neat graphs and such.

I'm simply looking into this because I like gadgets, and I see this as something cool that could also possibly help me maintain my fitness and weight level. I'm pretty sure everyone in this thread is here for more or less similar reasons as well.

Raging against exercise gadgets (or gadgets that assist with a fitness regimen) isn't going to solve any of the obesity or dietary issues in the US. As for that, I'd like to think we've made *some* strides... at least fast food joints are starting to offer decent "salad" choices along with their usual fare, and people in general seem to be more aware of what they're putting in their bodies. Yeah, still a long way to go, though.

I still can't believe people find it so hard to not put the fork in their mouth too many times. The math here is easy.

I keep getting this silver spoon stuck in mine.

Hopers wrote:

I have one of these and I love it. For me, it's less about laziness and more about accountability. I have no choice about whether or not I record my weight. The scale is doing it for me no matter what. I had a terrible tendency to step on my scale, not like the number and then ignore it. Now I have to see my data points.

It has to do with the fact that people buy expensive gadgets, get gym memberships, and hire personal trainers, and generally, it's not helping. Anecdotally, I'm sure this scale has changed someone's life. But until people can stop over-feeding themselves, nothing will help.

The weight loss industry continues to fleece. Oh, and our insurance rates are going up. Really, it actually makes me angry. I'd hope it'd make people angry enough to change their habits (for their sake, their family's sake, and for the sake of our society), but it doesn't seem to.

I think I understand where you're going with this, but you're painting with far to broad a brush.

Equally, gym memberships are not "fleecing" you. Most gym fees are - in my experience - pretty reasonable; a good treadmill and a set of free-weights are going to set you back several years of typical gym fees and that's if you have the space for them. I've always been happy with every gym I've been a member of.

You're absolutely right that buying a gym membership, or this scale, or any other gadget is not going to instantly make you healthier, fitter, slimmer, and more muscular. But I don't see withings making any such claims on their website. And I'm sure there are plenty of people - amongst which I count myself - who are in good shape, excercise regularly and vigourously, and eat well, who'd also like a bit more data about their bodies, a bit more conveniently recorded.

Also, as an aside, not everyone weighs themselves to track weight loss. Particularly when considering scales that measure body fat / lean mass / muscle mass etc., some of us are concerned more with lean mass gain while keeping body fat levels at a specific point. And I know plenty of people who track their body fat to ensure it doesn't drop too low.